SILVER SHOALS: FIVE FISH THAT MADE BRITAIN. By Charles Rangeley-Wilson.

2018 1st edition. 8vo (160 x 222mm). Ppviii,359. B/w heading vignettes. Blue boards, spine titled in silver-gilt.

"On these rain-swept islands at the edge of the North Atlantic man and fish go back a long way. Fish are woven through the fabric of the country's history: we depend on them - for food, for livelihood and for fun - and now their fate depends on us in a relationship which has become more complex, passionate and precarious in the sophisticated twenty-first century. In Silver Shoals Charles Rangeley-Wilson travels north, south, east and west through the British Isles tracing the histories, living and past, of our most iconic fish - cod, carp, eels, salmon and herring - and of the fishermen who catch them and care for them. In the company of trawlermen, longshoremen, conservationists and anglers Charles goes to sea in a trawler, whiles away afternoons setting eel nets, tries to bag his first elusive carp and drifts for herring on Guy Fawkes night as firework starburst the sky. Underscoring this journey is a fascinating historical exploration of these creatures that have shaped our island story. We learn how abundant and valued these fish were centuries before our current crisis of over-fishing: we learn how eels built our monasteries, how cod sank the Spanish Armada, how fish and chips helped us through two world wars. Of course there is a deeper environmental dimension to the story, but Charle's optimistic perspective is this: no one is more invested in fish than the fishermen whose lives depend on them. If we can find a way to harness that passion then the future of fish and fishing in Britain could be as extraordinary as its past."